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by viraseii



Category: Original Work
Genre: Espionage, F/M, Original Character Death(s), Original Character(s), Secret Intelligence Service, Spies & Secret Agents, death lol
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-03
Updated: 2016-07-03
Packaged: 2018-07-19 22:53:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7380733
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/viraseii/pseuds/viraseii
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>secret agents bruhh</p>
            </blockquote>





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**Author's Note:**

> note my knowledge of this kind of stuff comes solely from like james bond and mission impossible movies

Arris North stares straight ahead as if unseeing. One foot in front of the other, the regular, calm breathing that wafts out in wisps from his lips, the casual grace of his relaxed gait, the dampness of moisture suspended in the air. Every muscle in his body is on alert, and his pinpricks of pupils follow every movement. The chill in the air permeates his flesh.

A bird trills, high and piercing, somewhere ahead of him. He turns the corner. The car rolls toward the curb soundlessly, the handle to the door slick with morning rain and shockingly cool to the tips of his fingers.

The drive is short.

 _Be alert. Be aware._ Speed and agility are the only things he is allowed to rely on.

He accepts a small slip of paper, scribbled with letters strewn together in no particular order. This paper is his lifeline.

He steps out of the car after a few minutes, continuing his easy stroll through the winding streets of this sleeping city.

A clink of metal.

Every defense flies up immediately.

Arris drops to the ground as disturbed air whizzes in a line above him, the bullet colliding into the bricks in the wall to his left, shards bursting and clattering to the ground as the crack of impact resonates in the still air.

He’s already on his feet, cool metal in his hand, one shot fired at the passenger, one shot fired at the driver. He does not shoot to kill, but enough to dissuade any pursuit. His weakness, he knows, but it has yet to initiate his downfall.

Another car, driving down the street with more speed and urgency.

This one he dives into, the door open and closed almost instantaneously.

He smiles at the red-haired girl in the seat in front of him, eyes trailing the delicate necklace she’s wearing around her neck, even out in the field. Her eyes crinkle with a smile in the rearview mirror as they meet his. “You okay?” Her tone is light, casual, and alive with warmth.

His mouth quirks up in response to her radiant energy. “Never better. The infiltration was a success.”

“We’d better hurry to get it down to Decryption, then, hmm? And after that, you owe me a lunch date.”

He winks at her, earning a laugh. “I wouldn’t want to keep you waiting.”

Then everything is one confusing mess of fire and screaming and hard impact with the scorching asphalt, and everything fades.

-

“Speed. Agility. You must only rely on speed and agility, Eryn.” His voice jars her back to her thoughts. “Control your breathing.” She focuses as the treadmill increases in speed.

“Blood results are back.” She glances up momentarily, blinking at the doctor. “She should be fit for field work again.”

“We’ll see about that,” her examiner mumbles. “Thank you, doctor.” He turns back to her.

Something about this man makes her feel strange. As if she’s known him before, in a half-remembered dream. His dark hair, pushed up from the front, and his pale green eyes. The way he stands, the way he walks.

“You have no jurisdiction over the matter, Agent North,” a harsh voice rings out from behind her. The treadmill slows and stops, and Eryn turns around to acknowledge her visitor. Argenta Stone stands with her steel posture, her brown eyes piercing through her middle-aged face and her black hair swept back into a ponytail. This woman was the head of their department. If she is coming to see Eryn, it was likely that there is an assignment she plans to give to Eryn.

“Congratulations on regaining your strength, Agent Fawke,” Argenta says, the hint of a smile in her voice betraying what her face hides so well. “However, I regret to inform you that you’re being relieved of duty.”

Eryn’s blood runs ice cold, her neurons suddenly ceasing to function properly. “I don’t understand,” she tries.

“You have a flight this evening to catch. You’re being relocated to Nome. I trust there will be no difficulties.”

“Alaska?”

“Is there an issue?”

Eryn takes a few seconds before answering, trying to comprehend. “No.” She’s being let go. She’s being let go. She’s been relieved of duty, she’s being let go.

In desperation, she turns to North, but he refuses to meet her eyes.

“Mr. North, if you will come with me, please.” Argenta turns and strides out of the examination room.

-

It isn’t fair, really. It is in no way fair for this kind of conduct to be allowed. Eryn is left no weapons, no defense, and no semblance of an idea of the danger she is surrounded by.

North watches her. Four months in a coma, cosmetic surgery, and the light of happiness is still not back in her eyes. She doesn’t remember the explosion, not like he does. The fiery agony of recovering from burns that had touched his bone, and the ache in his heart from not knowing how okay she was… until he was well enough to visit her.

And after that, her retrograde amnesia.

It’s not fair, to him, to her, to anyone. She fumbles with the keys for a second before she disappears behind the door. Sighing, he leans away from the window and closes his eyes.

It’s only a few minutes before his device beeps, and he’s already wide awake and rushing out the door. They’re here.

-

Eryn is woken by the sound of gunfire. She’s burrowed under several layers, trying to expel the cold from her limbs. The sheets are crisp and clean, the house dark and silent but for the shots resounding outside.

Panic flares up in her body, adrenaline already pumping. She has nothing, nothing she can use. Pulling on a sweater quickly, she pads softly down the stairs and parts the curtains from the corner. A flash in the dark of the night. She can’t make out how many people there are, but there is another vehicle that isn’t hers.

Before her eyes can discern the moving shadows into people, the glass bursts apart and she rolls back as cold washes through the room. When she glances up from underneath her mess tangled hair, shock streaks through her bones at the familiar face.

Agent Arris North, last seen in her examination room earlier this morning, in Washington.

He lunges toward her and pushes her back, toward the stairs, as more shapes roll in through the shattered opening. She clings to his arm as he raises his gun higher into the air, pointing at the corner of her ceiling.

“What are you doing?” she breathes.

“Drop it,” a harsh voice calls out from one of the four figures she can see. Arris inhales slowly, before setting his gun on the ground.

“North?” Eryn whispers into his ear again.

His light green gaze turns to her briefly. “Trust me.”

They move forward quickly and cautiously, approaching the duo, roughly seizing them both and pressing their arms behind their back, searching their bodies, rough, rough, rough. Eryn knows she has no chance of fighting this. There is nothing to do.

They’re pushed into the back of a vehicle and everything is dark as they start to drive away.

“Why are you here?” she asks Arris.

He gazes out the stained window at his limited view of the Alaskan sky. “To protect you. It would seem I have failed.”

“Why did they send you to protect me? I’ve been let go.”

“Not quite,” is his reply. He doesn’t look at her.

She can’t explain what she feels toward him. There’s a certain gravity in the way he holds himself, something that makes her want to be next to him, get to know him. She doesn’t feel like it should be classified as love, but there is no harm in asking. There isn’t going to be a better time than now.

“What was our relationship before my accident?” Eryn asks boldly. If she doesn’t ask him now, she fears she may never have a chance.

He glances at her, alarmed. “Does it seem like there was one?”

“Yes.”

He’s studying her hair. It’s messy and unkempt, the dark red dye old and wearing off so that it’s a cross between red and brown. She can feel his gaze, travelling slowly along each strand. “How so?” he asks, his voice reserved and mildly curious.

“You feel familiar to me,” she says, hesitantly. When he doesn’t show any sign of responding, she speaks again after a few more moments. “Who are they? Why are they targeting me?”

His voice is riddled with more ease with this change in topic. “They’re part of an underground syndicate. Months ago we intercepted a message. It was believed they have intentions to coordinate a mass bombing attack throughout France in a couple more months. Since that first message was intercepted, we’ve been working on cracking their code, uncovering their plans, stopping them from harming innocent civilian lives. It was on a mission to intercept another message that they successfully managed to bomb your vehicle and hospitalize you.

“It seems that since they now know who you are, they are targeting you for a ticket into our weaknesses. This is the reason you were relocated here. You were a weakness in the secret service. So they set you out here as bait. I’m sorry.” His eyes are searching the deep blue sky overhead once more.

She hesitates, absorbing his words. “You sound bitter,” she finally decides on saying.

His eyebrows furrow together slightly in a frown. “Perhaps I am.”

She moves closer to him. “Why?”

“Are you not?”

Eryn considers the question. “No, not really. It happened, and that can’t be changed. The circumstances are unique, and therefore the decisions made by Stone are unique. The protection of the secret service is more important than my own individual safety. Some sacrifices have to be made.”

Arris falls silent.

-

 _Some sacrifices have to be made._ Not her. She shouldn’t ever be sacrificed; she’s too pure, too good, and she deserves infinitely better.

The road is rough. He closes his eyes and allows himself to drift into a haze between waking and dreaming, his thoughts racing.

He needed to plant the bug. That was all that Stone had said. He knew what it meant. She did not expect him to come back.

Every jolt in the road grated his entire body uncomfortably against the freezing metal of their vehicle. They were travelling quickly and carelessly. He’d known as soon as Stone had said the name Nome. Nome was their base, and enemy’s base of operations. He’d known her plans, and despite the will to forgive that was in Eryn’s heart, he could not let his emotions go.

The sound of muted conversation coming through the barrier between them and their captors. The stale smell of dust and sweat hanging faintly in the air. Everything is real in this moment like it never has been before. He can feel his own mortality, ticking down, counting out his breaths.

What is death, anyway? Death is the termination of existence. He doesn’t know why it’s feared so much, when after it there is nothing to be felt, nothing to be known. It’s the unknown, the uncertainty, which people shy away from.

For him, it’s the pain.

Eryn tries to say something to him again, but he doesn’t acknowledge her. He simply waits.

When they arrive in a few hours, they’re both locked up in a small bedroom. He doesn’t sleep that night, hoping Eryn isn’t harmed. The sheets are grey, the walls cracking with paint. A single window offers a stained view of the night sky outside, only a few stars bright enough to make out past the grime and dust.

As morning dawns, he’s escorted out of his room and down a hall. Eryn sits in a chair, and she looks up as he enters and is seated next to her. They’re left alone, then.

Slowly, he reaches up and unclasps a necklace from around his throat and holds it out in front of him. The chain is a darkened silver. The small, ornate pendent is in the shape of a heart with a tiny diamond nestled at the bottom crevice. He’d gifted it to her on her birthday, just weeks before the accident.

He reaches for her hand and piles it into her palm, closing her fingers over it. “This was yours,” he says quietly as a door bangs open and heavy footsteps echo around the room. His heart begins to thud. He wants to save her, but he’s not sure if he can.

She looks at the necklace in her hand, her bright blue eyes far away, trailing a finger over the fire-blackened heart. Love that burned out too fast.

A man takes his seat across the desk in front of them. There are paintings and clocks on the wall behind them, as well as a shelf of untouched books in the corner. His head is square and silvered hair is cut close to his scalp. His hazel eyes are harsh, grating.

“Eryn has amnesia,” North says, trying. “You can let her go. She doesn’t remember a thing about you. I know more. I can help if you let her go.” He searches the expression of the man in front of him, fiddling with the inside of his sleeve where the device he’s supposed to plant is stitched in.

“I can let her go,” the man says.

His tone is cruel. North understands with glaring, stunning clarity. He can’t breathe for a second. “No,” he gasps. He turns to Eryn, who looks at him, her jewel blue eyes puzzled. “I loved you,” he whispers. For the first time in four months, all his grief implodes on him, berating every string in his heart as he squeezes his eyes shut. He will show no tears.

A single gunshot is all it takes for North’s world to collapse.

He still owed her a lunch date.

**Author's Note:**

> DID YOU LIKE IT????????


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